


knowing me, knowing you

by gentext



Category: Fire Emblem Series, Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Fluff, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-17
Updated: 2019-12-17
Packaged: 2021-02-26 01:47:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 821
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21825406
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gentext/pseuds/gentext
Summary: Felix's lips purse in thought. “How did you do it so easily? Approach girls like it was nothing?”“Well, I’m a naturally charming person,” Sylvain offers helpfully.Felix and Sylvain have baggage and very little emotional intelligence but they love each other very much, so it's okay.
Relationships: Felix Hugo Fraldarius/Sylvain Jose Gautier
Comments: 2
Kudos: 87





	knowing me, knowing you

“How do you do it?” Felix asks one day.

Sylvain buries his face deeper into his lover’s neck. “Hm?” he mumbles blearily. The morning cold is beginning to seep into their bed. He presses himself closer to the warmth of Felix’s body.

“You know,” Felix begins. Sylvain doesn’t know. Felix is good at a lot of things, but communicating his feelings isn’t one of them. “Talking.”

“You’re doing it right now,” Sylvain says, eyes still closed.

“No,” Felix says. “I mean—” Sylvain feels the bed shift as Felix turns in his arms so they’re facing each other. He opens his eyes to meet his.

Felix looks at him with his pale gaze, drowsy but awake, hair thrown wildly around him and sticking to his forehead and a strand between his lips.

“I mean…” Felix trails off. “You were always trying to pick up girls.” His lips purse in thought. “How did you do it so easily? Approach them like it was nothing?”

“Well, I’m a naturally charming person,” Sylvain offers helpfully. He knows Felix is still groggy by the way his comment doesn’t earn him a roll of the eyes, but an affectionate snort instead. Even now, Sylvain thinks, it feels like a privilege to see the usually tightly-wound man let down his guard like this. He feels Felix’s warm breath ghost across his face.

“It wasn’t a big deal to me,” Sylvain continues. _But you are_ , he thinks. _You’re the most important thing in my life, and_ _you’re the only person who sees me, and it scares me_. “It was just fun to fool around sometimes.”

“What about when they rejected you? Left you?”

Sylvain thinks about Miklan, and the Margrave Gautier, and high-ceilinged ballrooms with decorated courtiers and thighs rubbed raw after hours of horseback riding, and calloused hands that thumb at Felix’s cheek more gently than he’s held any lance.

“I got used to it.”

“Used to it?”

“Well, you know.” This time it’s Sylvain flummoxed for words. “Like I said, it wasn’t that big of a deal. I liked that that there wasn’t any commitment.”

Felix furrows his brow and slides a hand out from under the covers. Sylvain feels his warm fingers brush back tangled orange hair from his forehead. When he doesn’t press for an answer, Sylvain continues:

“You messed around for a bit and had some fun, and it wasn’t about getting to know the other person. It was about being someone else. And being loved as someone else.” Sylvain grimaces. It sounds worse coming from his mouth. “It was comforting knowing it was fake, temporary. All things come to an end, and I wasn’t responsible for it. It wasn’t about me.”

“It wasn’t about you,” Felix echoes.

“It was about my Crest,” he says firmly. Then, after a pause, he adds, “And it was about Sylvain of House Gautier, the womanizer, the noble, the airheaded boy who only knew how to chase skirts.”

“It wasn’t about you,” Felix repeats carefully, this time with understanding.

“It was never about me.”

Felix strokes his cheek gently. “Your brother—” Sylvian winces. “It wasn’t your fault.”

Sylvain closes his eyes and allows himself the small luxury of feeling Felix’s well-worn hands cradle his face. He reaches up with his own and intertwines their fingers. “I know.” Sylvain shifts in bed into a more comfortable position. He’s wide awake now. “What brought this up? About… _talking_ to people.”

Felix shrugs as best he can under the covers. “Nothing,” he says. “I’m just not very good at it. Creating attachments so casually.” It’s more reflection than accusation. After a pause, Felix swallows thickly and looks away. “This—us—I don’t take it lightly. I don’t want to lose you, too.” The last word is so quiet Sylvain isn’t certain he’s heard it.

“You won’t,” he says, and he means it. He takes Felix’s hand in his own, memorizing the protruding knuckles and calloused pads and strong fingers. Rubbing circles into his palm, Sylvain repeats, “You won’t lose me. And I don’t want to lose you. I—” He bites his lip. “I care about you. I want this—us—to be real, but I don’t know how, but you make me want to try even when I’m afraid.” He brings Felix’s hand to his lips, kissing the space between two knuckles. Felix’s expression softens.

“I know,” he says. He leans forward to press a kiss to Sylvain’s forehead.

Sylvain sighs in pleasure, releasing his hand to cup Felix’s face. _He knows, he knows_ , he thinks to himself, and _he_ knows, too, that it’s Sylvain saying this and not the Gautier heir or the honey-tongued charmer but the foolish, foolish man in their bed—and most of all, he hopes Felix knows, too. “I love you,” Sylvain says, and he closes the gap between them and he feels it more than he hears Felix mouth it back into his parted lips.

**Author's Note:**

> i woke up early to work on finals and then i wrote this instead


End file.
